Bennett
BennettFlash 90

Bayit Yehudi Chairman and Minister of Economics, Naftali Bennett, made clear Thursday that his party will not be a partner in a government that holds diplomatic negotiations based on the idea of returning to Israel's pre-1967 borders.

"The Bayit Yehudi party, which I head, will not be a partner, even for one second, in a government that agrees to negotiate based on [pre-]'67 lines,” he stated. “Our capital, Jerusalem, is not up for negotiations and will never be up for negotiations.”

Minister of Construction and Housing, Uri Ariel (Bayit Yehudi), also commented Thursday on the possibility of negotiations with the Palestinian Authority.

"It should be made clear to Mr. Kerry that Israel will never return to the Auschwitz borders, will not freeze settlement activity and will not agree to offer a sacrifice so that he can get a Nobel Peace Prize," he said. "I am certain that the prime minister will not be a partner to abandoning Israel's security.”

The term "Auschwitz borders" was coined by former Israeli Foreign Minister Abba Eban, to express what she saw as the mortal danger to Israel's security by ceding the strategically-important territories. 

The chair of the Knesset's Committee of Interior, MK Miri Regev (Likud), also reacted to the report that Israel had agreed to talks based on the idea of a return to pre-1967 lines.

"If the reports are true,” she said, “then this is a mistaken decision that poses a danger and does not serve the security of the state of Israel, and hurts the settlement enterprise as well as the settlers."

The pre-June 1967 lines, sometimes referred to in short as the "1967 lines," are the borders that separated Israel from Jordan in the 18-year interlude between the 1949 armistice agreement and the 1967 Six Day War.

After emerging victorious from the 1967 Six Day War, Israel widened its borders eastward, liberating the ancestral Jewish lands of Judea and Samaria, as well as the Golan Heights, Gaza and Sinai Desert.

The Sinai Desert was eventually ceded to Egypt in return for a peace agreement following the 1973 "Yom Kippur War."